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February 17 & 18, 2010 February 19, 2010

As part of my last shipment from Cheap Joe’s I bought a couple of Sketch & Wash pencils. I bought them because I thought I heard someone say they used them to sketch their drawings on paper before starting a watercolor painting. I thought the lead was light and just dissolved and disappeared as you painted. Well OBVIOUSLY NOT! On Wednesday I tried my first work with these pencils and I now know that they are used to make a painting that looks like a drawing made from ink washes. And that is fine. Here is my first attempt.

Drawing #1 using Sketch & Wash Pencils

I tried doing a second drawing yesterday while I was at the surgery center with my husband and I learned something about where my head is right now. In the past I have focused my drawing and paintings on animals, nature, landscapes, flowers but virtually never on faces, figures or portraits. Yesterday I drew the face of a beautiful young woman and I tore it up and threw it out. Not because the technical content wasn’t good but because it looked sterile to me – nothing behind the face. When I look at the drawing I did on Tuesday, I see a man satisfied with where he is at. He has had a hard life but he values where he has been, he has had some success and he is planning for tomorrow. He has experience, confidence and history. This drawing was inspired by the eyes of an Auschwitz survivor I saw in a photograph in Smithsonian. I see a facial feature that speaks to me and I use it to start a drawing but the drawing becomes mine as I add features and expression. I need to think more about this and how to act on it. This was a revelation for me. All I know is you can expect to see more faces in the future.

Yes, I’ve used Reeves and Cretacolor brands but I have never thought about using them just to do the drawing for a watercolor. Is this what you meant? I haven’t used them very much and have found that some colors dissolve better than others. The brand didn’t seem to matter. Is this your experience?